Takeaways From The Times’s Investigation Into Trump’s War on the Inquiries Around Him

WASHINGTON — President Trump has called the Russia investigation a hoax, a witch hunt and fake news. But since he has been in office, Mr. Trump has tried to end the inquiry into his campaign’s possible coordination with Russia during the 2016 presidential election, opening himself up to questions about whether these efforts constitute attempts to obstruct justice.

A review by The New York Times found a continuous, behind-the-scenes effort by Mr. Trump to undermine multiple investigations that have touched his presidency. His efforts included seeking to derail federal law enforcement through targeted political appointments and a public campaign to discredit the Russia investigation, which is led by the special counsel, Robert S. Mueller III.

Here are some takeaways from The Times report about pressure inside the Trump administration to protect the president from those inquiries.

Mr. Trump wanted to put a perceived loyalist in charge of a federal inquiry in New York related to hush money payments made by his former personal lawyer.

After subjecting his first attorney general, Jeff Sessions, to protracted humiliation over Mr. Sessions’s decision to recuse himself from the Russia investigation and then firing him, Mr. Trump asked his newly installed acting attorney general, Matthew G. Whitaker, if one of the president’s perceived allies could take control of the federal investigation in New York involving him.

Mr. Whitaker, a loyalist who had told people that his job was to protect the president, said no. The person Mr. Trump wanted, Geoffrey S. Berman, the United States attorney for the Southern District of New York, had already recused himself over another routine conflict of interest.

Mr. Whitaker has told associates that part of his job was to “jump on a grenade” for the president, a comment not previously reported. But there is no evidence that Mr. Whitaker took further steps to wrest the sprawling inquiry from career Justice Department prosecutors. Mr. Whitaker did tell some associates that the New York prosecutors needed “adult supervision.”

Mr. Trump’s public attacks on the Russia investigation have evolved from a public relations strategy to a legal strategy.

The president’s assault on investigators on Twitter and in public interviews moved beyond his typical criticism of individuals into a mosaic of efforts to undermine every facet of the investigation. That includes attacking the investigators, raising questions about the legitimacy of law enforcement investigative tools and discrediting witnesses — most of whom were close allies he once praised.

The president cheered efforts by Republican loyalists in Congress who began investigations into cases and pressed for details about confidential Justice Department investigative procedures. One loyalist, Representative Matt Gaetz, a second-term Republican from Florida, spearheaded this campaign in July 2017 while he killed time at an airport in between flights.

Mr. Trump’s lawyers liked the lawmakers’ campaign to erode Americans’ confidence in the F.B.I., the federal government’s premier law enforcement agency. And they especially liked that Mr. Trump has been a persistent and public participant in it, because, the lawyers say, it is implausible that Mr. Trump could be part of a secret conspiracy.

White House lawyers wrote a confidential memo about misleading public statements after the firing of Michael T. Flynn, Mr. Trump’s first national security adviser.

White House lawyers were concerned about the varying public accounts of the reasons behind Mr. Flynn’s abrupt departure. Mr. Flynn resigned on Feb. 13, 2017, after it was reported that he was in touch with Russia’s ambassador to the United States at the end of 2016 and discussed recent Obama administration sanctions. Mr. Flynn said he resigned because he “inadvertently” misled Vice President Mike Pence and other senior White House officials about his discussions with the Russian ambassador.

The next day, the president and his advisers met in the Oval Office to discuss how to explain Mr. Flynn’s departure. One of the advisers mentioned in passing that the House speaker at the time, Paul D. Ryan of Wisconsin, told reporters that the president had asked Mr. Flynn to resign. Mr. Trump liked that version better than the explanation Mr. Flynn gave in his resignation letter and instructed his press secretary at the time, Sean Spicer, to “say that” when he briefed the news media.

Mr. Trump believed he put an end to the Russia investigation when he fired Mr. Flynn.

During a lunch with one of his longtime allies, Chris Christie, the former Republican governor of New Jersey, Mr. Trump said that firing Mr. Flynn would end the Russia inquiry.

Mr. Christie disagreed with that assessment. “This Russia thing is far from over,” Mr. Christie wrote that he told Mr. Trump, who responded: “What do you mean? Flynn met with the Russians. That was the problem. I fired Flynn. It’s over.”

Jared Kushner, the president’s son-in-law and senior adviser, was also at the lunch with Mr. Christie and viewed the firing the way his father-in-law did. “That’s right, firing Flynn ends the whole Russia thing,” Mr. Kushner said, according to Mr. Christie’s book.